Bellator 60: What to Watch For

Now promoting champions in eight different weight categories, the
Chicago-based promotion kicks off its sixth season with a
featherweight title showdown between reigning belt holder Joe Warren
and Summer Series tournament winner Pat Curran at
The Venue at Horseshoe Casino in Hammond, Ind.

Airing on Friday at 8 pm. ET/PT on MTV2 and Epix,
Bellator 60 marks the promotion’s Friday-night debut. Featuring
an intriguing main event and a handful of anticipated tournament
quarterfinal matchups, the event signals the start of arguably
Bellator’s most ambitious season to date. Here is what to watch for
at Bellator 60:

Baddest Man on the Planet

Talking trash works when you are winning. After you get laid out?
Not as much.

That is the challenge that Bellator’s featherweight champion now
faces. Known for his resilience as much as for his top-drawer
Greco-Roman wrestling skills, Warren must find a way to rebound
from his one-punch knockout defeat to Alexis Vila
in the Season 5 bantamweight tournament quarterfinals in
September.

Prior to that loss, Warren had been undefeated in the Bellator
cage, fighting through adversity against Patricio
Freire and Joe Soto to win
the Season 2 featherweight tournament and then the world title. The
problem is that Warren was just knocked cold while competing a
weight class that was supposed to grant him advantages in that
regard. While he cannot be faulted for trying to win titles in two
weight classes, the maneuver most certainly backfired.

Warren himself has admitted that he is undersized as a
featherweight, so it will now take some doing to convince most
observers that his title reign at 145 pounds carries with it the
same degree of legitimacy it did prior to the Vila knockout. Warren
now faces arguably his greatest adversary in well-rounded
countryman Curran. How will the 35-year-old respond?

Curran’s Quest

Curran has one hell of an opportunity in front of him.

The only man to win Bellator tournaments in two different weight
classes, Curran initially fought his way to the Season 2
lightweight tournament crown before he was outpointed by
then-champion Eddie
Alvarez 11 months ago.

Undeterred, Curran cut to featherweight and performed like a boss
in the Summer Series tournament, first tapping Luis
Palomino with a Peruvian necktie before outpointing British
upstart Ronnie Mann
in the semis. Curran saved his best performance for the final
round, however, finishing former Sengoku
champion Marlon
Sandro with a precise head kick and ground-and-pound.

Can Curran succeed in his new weight class where he previously
failed? A victory over Warren would be a sweet payday after coming
oh so close to becoming champion at 155 pounds.

With that level of reward, however, also comes risk. Just as Warren
likely feels the pressure to overcome his recent knockout, so, too,
must Curran find his way over the hump to a title win. It is true
that Curran is only 24-year-old and has plenty of time left as a
mixed martial artist, but this is a wild sport. So many variables
can affect the course of a career or even a single fight. Title
shots must be seized with ferocity and sincerity, because it is
never a given that another one will come.

Marlon
Sandro File Photo

It's time for Sandro to deliver.

Return of the Violence

Sandro has not yet shown what he is capable of in the Bellator
cage.

In 2010, the heavy-handed
Nova Uniao representative was selected to Sherdog.com’s
All-Violence First Team following brutal one-punch knockouts of
Tomonari
Kanomata and Masanori
Kanehara that saw both victims leave the ring on
stretchers.

Put simply, Sandro has not delivered with the same type of killer
instinct that gained him considerable notoriety during his Sengoku
career. While this is tempered by the fact that the Brazilian holds
a 3-1 Bellator record -- his only loss came to the highly regarded
Curran -- fans of the 34-year-old are likely still yearning for a
signature knockout on American soil.

Sandro rebounded from his loss to Curran to earn his first Bellator
finish, tapping Rafael Dias
with a slick arm-triangle in November. Can he capitalize on that
momentum and find his first
Bellator knockout, or will the highlight-reel finish continue to
elude him?

Second Chances for Straus, Mann

Daniel
Straus and Ronnie Mann
are two of Bellator’s most talented featherweights. Though they
compete using different styles, they likely share a similar mindset
heading into Season 6 after coming up short in their previous
tournament attempts.

Straus looked tremendous in his first two Bellator appearances,
outlasting a game Nazareno
Malegarie before submitting Kenny
Foster with a guillotine choke to advance to the Season 4
tournament final. The Ohioan could not overcome Freire, however,
falling by unanimous decision to the Brazilian and losing his
chance to challenge for Warren’s title.

Mann has also impressed in his Bellator career, knocking out
Adam
Schindler in the Summer Series tournament quarterfinals prior
to losing on points to eventual winner Curran in the semis. “Kid
Ninja” rebounded from the defeat by submitting Foster in October,
finishing the
Team Bombsquad representative with a triangle choke in arguably
the Brit’s best Bellator performance yet.

Which one -- if either -- of these men will capitalize on a second
opportunity to earn a crack at Bellator gold?

Bezerra rides a seven-fight winning streak into his first
tournament berth and has finished all four of his Bellator
opponents, earning three first-round submissions along the way.
“Popo” showed resourcefulness in his most recent outing, as he took
serious damage in his Bellator 57 clash with Douglas
Evans. After failing on a number of submission attempts and
eating some brutal ground-and-pound as a result, Bezerra managed to
lock up a fight-ending heel hook to snatch his sixth career
submission win.

Meanwhile, da Silva drew a difficult Bellator debut in Sandro last
year. Nonetheless, “Junior PQD” hung tough for the duration of
their three-round Summer Series quarterfinal, dropping a split
decision to the former Sengoku champion at Bellator 46. Da Silva
bounced back from the defeat on Oct. 1, jumping all over Bryan
Goldsby and ending his night with a brabo choke in just
3:51.

The bottom line: between the two Brazilians, only six of their 28
career outings have gone to the judges’ scorecards. Put these two
in a cage together, and do not be surprised if fireworks ensue.